Microsoft filed a formal antitrust complaint against Motorola Mobility this morning in Brussels, following the European Commission's decision to clear Google's takeover of the mobile biz earlier this month.
Redmond's beef with Google relates to "standard essential patents" that MS rather hysterically claimed could be used by …

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So, a lot of companies spent lots of money on R&D which are used in standard tech. and everyone else must pay at FRAND.

MS & Apple can charge what they want for their patents. These example include FATS, icons displayed in rows, rounded corner on tablets, retrieving phone number from text, 3D UI that's displayed behind the screen. hahahaa.

MS & Apple are making their money on the back some really innovative like IBM, Motorola etc... And they are still complain.

This is even more so for Apple. There's nothing coming out of them even worth mentioning.

They are not part of the pool

When the merger was first announced the ANALists (including elreg by the way) all missed the interesting part of the MM portfolio - everything related to IPTV and codecs from the days when it was the leader in STB development.

Google can use these to beat anyone in the consumer electronics arena into a submission and cross-licensing deal which is exactly what they are doing now.

They have simply set the royalty for them to be reciprocal of what MSFT is asking for their patents from Android (around 2.25% before any discounts). This will be the explanation given back to the EU commission and to the FTC and this explanation will probably stand up to court scrutiny too.

As a side effect it also plays merry hell with the MPEG-LA business model.

Is it nice? Probably no. Is it evil? Do not think so. It is reciprocal - Google is asking same MSFT is asking. Is it fair? Nobody knows because nobody has seen the MSFT patents for which Android manufacturers have to pay 2.25% license fee.

Re: Live by the software patent, die by the software patent

Please define Fair and Reasonable Mr Microsoft

Because I think Barnes and Noble have an issue with your definition of that. ie you want to charge them more then you charge for your entire OS license yet the patents claimed are for minute parts of the OS.

I for one am glad to read that Google finally has a club to hold over these other companies head. the game is and has been a game of mutual assured destruction and it sucks.

I can't believe it, two of the largest patent trolls, Microsoft and Apple, are screaming foul because of what Motorola has done! With Apple trying to completely destroy Android and Microsoft trying to be the standard of the world, this whole thing is a colossal joke.

In it to win it

I feel ashamed of having supported Google. At one time they seemed to be innovators but now they just copy, sue, force us to use things we don't want and close services we actually wanted (especially angry after the knol announcement!!!)

Now I was just creating a Gmail account for my wife and it asked me for my credit card to create a Google Wallet! Where is this going to end. I'm not recommending Google anymore.

Was the credit card mandatory?

You did not say if the creation of the google-wallet and by extension the providing of your credit card details was mandatory or not? Was it? If so then bad on Google, if not then decline Google Wallet and carry-on.

Re: fuck Google, fuck MS, fuck Apple and fuck WebM

I Love It

Now MS has to eat the $hit they have served up to many other companies, including *everyone* using Linux. They suggested that Linux would violate dozens of patents they refused to specify. MS and Apple are also trying to suck the blood out of Android vendors (or stop them from selling altogether) and it seems they succeeded in many cases.

Let this patent war heat up even more and make these "highly intelligent executives" reconsider the whole patent system. It is clearly broken (think of Amazon's "one-click" patent) and these people need to feel the heat and then talk to the politicos. Everybody will benefit. It took two wars to end the major wars, let's see how many it will take in the patent belligerence.

Re: I Love It

"It took two wars to end the major wars"

Oh how I wish you were right about that. From what I can see looking at news from around the world it's been a long time since the possibility of World War III breaking out was comfortably remote. The current hotbed is Iran/Israel. If that flares up it's going to be a real mess. Maybe not a world war, but there are enough nations ready to jump in on one side or the other to make it close enough, especially if someone does something stupid like use nukes or thermobarics in a preemptive strike.

Caution, Spin doctors at work.

"And Microsoft is making its patents -standard essential and otherwise — available to all Android manufacturers on fair and reasonable terms. In fact, more than 70 percent of Android devices are now licensed to use Microsoft’s patent portfolio."

MS (IMHO) appears to be extorting money from manufacturers of Android devices utilizing patents that at least one company (Barnes & Noble) are paying a legal-team to expose as being irrelevant. Other manufacturers signed an NDA (bad move) so we only hear the voice of MS and their allies in cases like these, and of course their competition is being painted as the bad-guy.

The trouble with "Fair and Reasonable Terms" is that it has never been defined. Fair and Reasonable for whom? If I'm a small start-up then I might be able to afford sweat-equity to write software that adheres to a truly open standard, but I might not be able to pay the additional and ongoing costs of licensing.

Why is everyone screaming at Google?

All Google is doing is keeping the same liscensing model that Motorola has had for years. Why is it that no one complained about it until Google took it over? It's the same fee, it's just going to be going to a different company.